Chapter Text
“Stephanie Brown, if you are not down here in five minutes, we will leave without you!”
“Literally, how would you leave without me? Today is all about me!” Stephanie calls back with a cackle, but she attempts to balance another shoebox of her belongings in her arms. Enough people already took the big things for her. She wants to handle everything small.
She casts one last look at the small room. She scrubbed it clean two nights ago, taking everything she valued and shoving it into one of her two suitcases or her duffel bag. Only the furniture remains, stripped of any personality. The empty mattress sits on the iron bed frame. The empty dresser sits with nothing left of Stephanie but an awkward stain of purple from when she did her nails and knocked over the whole bottle.
“It’s about time we’re getting rid of you.”
Stephanie rolls her eyes. “Ha. Ha. That’s so funny, actually.”
“I try, just for you.” Tim stands in the doorway, leaning against it in the fake-casual one of his. He stares at her as she looks around the room, trying to be subtle and failing miserably. Ever since he found her on the dock with her dead father, he walks on eggshells around her. She can’t quite blame him for that.
It feels like karma. All those times she tiptoed around him when he first came back to life, she thought he would find her presence ‘calming but not suffocating.’ When she told him that back then, he laughed and flipped her off. Now, she gets it. Having anyone watch you, waiting for you to break, is the definition of suffocating.
She doesn’t break, though.
Her stitches heal until her limp disappears altogether. Her arm regains full mobility. Her nose might be a little crooked these days, but it no longer spurts blood periodically. She gets better and better until all of her injuries heal.
Well.
Steph took enough AP Psych to know the mental injuries might take years to heal, but she can ignore the grieving and the screaming and the crying right now. Today should be an exciting day, and she’ll be damned if she gives that away to Arthur Brown. She gave him too many years of her life already; she gave him too many thoughts and questions and time to give him anything else.
“I can take that box for you—”
“Thanks, Batman, but it weighs like two pounds. I can handle it.” She knocks their shoulders together as she passes him, stepping out of the room.
(At the end of the first night in the hospital, Damian sat at the edge of her bed. He refused to look at her. Instead, he stared out the window with his rumpled button-down and his wild hair, and he took a deep breath, shoulders shaking ever so slightly.
“I owe you an apology,” he told her.
She nodded.
Neither of them said anything.
She cleared her throat and rasped, “so, let’s hear it.”
“When I told you you weren’t part of the family, that Bruce didn’t want you as part of the family… I went too far. I felt shackled by the mantle of Batman, and I was lashing out. I was… jealous.”
“Jealous?” she echoed.
He nodded. “Brown, you’re one of the bravest people I’ve ever met. To have you so boldly choose to follow your dreams, knowing it took sacrifice, knowing it would take you out of Gotham, made me jealous. I felt trapped in Gotham, and I know you felt trapped here too, but you found a way out anyway. You’re braver than me. I’m sorry for letting my jealousy blind me from that, and I’m sorry for what I said.”
A moment passed between them.
“I hate to say it, but yeah. I might be the bravest in the family.” She nudged him. “Look, we can talk more when I’m not sky-high on painkillers, and I’m not reeling from everything, and you can apologize again.”
“I know you value actions more than words, so…” He got up and shuffled through his bag. Then, he turned around and handed her a ring with keys.
She knew these keys.
She held them in her good arm (the other one, the one with the bullet wound in the shoulder, was ‘decommissioned’ for right now), and she clutched them in a fist. “Are these…?”
“Keys to your own room in the Wayne Manor. You have a home with us, Stephanie. I was a fool to ever think otherwise, and you were treated poorly if you ever thought otherwise.”)
Tim follows behind her, doing a great impression of a kicked dog. “Okay, but everyone else got to carry down a box, and I feel like I’m slacking a little in the best friend department. I refuse to be shown up by Damian, you know.”
“Damian and I are besties these days, you know.” She grins at him as she starts down the hallway. She shares this side with Cassandra, and until Damian manages to adopt another kid, she imagines it will stay that way. She likes the relative solitude of that; when she needs a break from the boys, she can retreat this way, knowing none of them will follow her.
And she gets to walk past the bust she shot in the face.
When she woke up one day to that sitting right outside her door, she burst out laughing. Everyone in the Manor claims ignorance, but she has a gut feeling Alfred was the one who put it here for her. He admires people with good marksmanship, and right now, she thinks she might be rivaling him.
Then again, who can ever rival Alfred?
He snorts. “That sounds awful, Steph. What do you even talk about? Taxes?”
“Your brother talks about more than taxes.” She nods to herself and then sends a smirk in Tim’s direction. “Sometimes, we talk about mortgages.”
“Truly thrilling.”
“Adulthood is hard. Maybe you should try it.” Sniffing like one of the Gotham elites, she starts to descend the stairs.
“You’re literally still seventeen—”
“I think, technically, you’re still seventeen too.”
“You cannot count the two years I was dead against me.”
“Oh, but technically, I’ve died too.”
“For three minutes!”
“I’m in the Dead Kids Club now. I’m actually the president of it.”
“You can’t elect yourself president.”
“Actually, Cass elected me president.”
“She was dead for one minute three years ago.”
“It counts.” Steph pauses by the kitchen right as Cass peeks her head out. She holds up a hand for a high-five, and Cass obliges without saying anything else, and Steph nods like this counts as confirmation. Tim throws up his hands in mock exasperation, but he struggles to bite back his smile.
She passes the box over to Cass, ignoring Tim’s cry of indignation, and as Cass hurries out to put it with everything else, Stephanie pauses and turns to Tim. “All honesty here. You going to be alright without me?”
(When Stephanie first woke up in the hospital, actual sutures in her bullet wounds rather than the shoddy stitches she threw in the pizza parlor and a cast over her nose, she caught sight of Tim sitting by her bedside.
She burst out crying immediately.
“Whoa, whoa! You’re not supposed to be awake yet!” Tim’s hands fluttered in the air, moments away from pulling her into a hug but determined not to make any injuries worse. He stared at her, not bothering to hide his exhaustion or his fear.
She flailed outwards, grabbing his sweatshirt strings and pulling him into a makeshift hug, and she shoved her face into his shoulder. “He’s gone.”
“He’s gone,” Tim confirmed softly, maneuvering her so he could lie on the bed next to her instead.
“He’s really gone.” And she couldn’t tell if she cried harder knowing that. All those years of having her father in Arkham, only moments away, were gone. All those years knowing she could still reach him if she needed him, even though she would never need him, were gone.
He was dead, and he was dead because he tried to kill her.
She knew she couldn’t pull the trigger, so when she rigged the gun to backfire, she hoped he would never pull the trigger on her. Shouldn’t sharing DNA mean something? Shouldn’t raising her mean something? Shouldn’t he look down at her, his own daughter, the person he was supposed to love unconditionally, mean something?
But he pulled the trigger, and he killed himself in his attempt to kill her.
She sobbed into Tim’s shoulder, gripping him hard, unable to anchor herself here. “He taught me how to tie a tie.”
“I know,” he murmured, working his hand up to run his fingers through her hair. “I know, Stephanie.”
“He taught me how to talk. And he tried to kill me.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
She cried louder.)
“Are you going to be alright without me?” Tim deflates under her gaze, though, and he laughs. “Is it wrong I kinda wish you wouldn’t be? I know you can handle everything life throws at you, and I love you for that, but I wish I had an excuse to come running to Baltimore to be your knight in shining armor.”
“You don’t need an excuse to come running to Baltimore. Just say you want to visit me.” She reaches over and grips his shoulders, and she looks at him, really looks at him.
She smiles. “When did we stop being kids, Tim?”
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” He smiles back at her. “You’re about to go off to college, Stephanie. You’re going to become a doctor.”
“I’m going to be a doctor.” She leans forward to press her forehead against his, and they stand like that, and she can remember all the years she spent by his side. She can remember the time he reached back for her hand, she can remember when she came into her own as a hero by his side, she can remember grieving him, she can remember honoring him, she can remember watching him relearn how to be part of a family, she can remember him relearning how to be her best friend, she can remember everything.
For two years, as children, you couldn’t separate Tim from Stephanie or Stephanie from Tim. Then, he died, and she still carried him with her.
She doesn’t need to carry him with her anymore, not like that. She doesn’t need to wear his colors and sit on rooftops alone anymore. Now, she carries him in her heart and, more realistically, in her phone’s contacts, and he’ll always be one call away.
And she has a feeling he’ll always pick up if he can.
“I still want you, Tim,” she whispers to him. “I think that’s better than needing you.”
“Maybe I’ll get there one day, but I still need you.”
They only part when someone starts laying on the horn, and they part with soft, embarrassed laughter.
She makes it halfway to the front door before she spins around, and she tackles Tim into the biggest hug of her life. He lets out a full-body laugh, and he spins her around in the air before gripping her back.
“This isn’t goodbye,” he tells her.
“No, this is a goodbye. It’s just not the last one.” She hugs him tighter before letting him go. She takes a second to smooth her hair back down and unruffle her winter coat. Then, she takes a deep breath.
She wishes Tim could drive her down to Baltimore, but she gets why he can’t, logistically. She already takes Duke with her, and Damian is still on his extended vacation. Damian offered to come back home for her, but she told him he wouldn’t need to do that. The oldest person in the family becomes Tim. The oldest bat in the family becomes Tim, at least, and they don’t want to leave the streets to only Cass, Jason, and Dick.
Tim has responsibilities as Batman these days. She never thought she’d see the day he became Batman, but he takes to it with a passion he hasn’t had since coming back to life. He keeps the streets safe, maybe even safer than how Bruce kept them. He comes back from patrols with small smiles.
His dreams are still in Gotham.
(“I have a solution,” Stephanie announced as she wobbled up the stairs. Tim hovered by her side, trying to make sure she didn’t fall without touching her. She already told him she didn’t want or need his help, and he refused to take that as an answer one day out of the hospital.
He hummed, not really paying attention, as she almost banged her arm against the railing. “Okay? Yeah? To what?”
“To your Bruce situation.”
That got Tim to stop hovering, and she tried to take off up the stairs. The casted leg really stopped her from lunging up the steps, though, and she ended up going at the same pace. Tim caught up to her in seconds.
“The Bruce situation? Are you… offering to go?” Judging by the way he said it so gingerly, afraid to speak it into existence, he knew that couldn’t be the right answer.
She shook her head. “Johns Hopkins calls, and I’m picking up.”
“I can’t go, especially not now, Steph. I’m Batman now.” He always paused as he said it, taking a second to savor the words. Tim was Batman now, and he relished in it even if he tried to pretend it didn’t affect him all that much. “Gotham needs me.”
“I know. That’s not the solution.”
She limped the rest of the way to her new bedroom, and she threw open the door.
Duke raised a hand in a half-wave. “Hey.”)
Dick and Jason meet her by the front door.
“Are you going to miss me?” she asks Jason as Dick practically knocks her down in a hug. She scoops him up (and damn, when did eleven-year-olds get so big) and lets him cling to her shoulders.
Jason rolls his eyes. “Nope.”
“Say it again but with feeling.”
“I’m going to miss you,” Dick shouts in her ear. He still has his little arms wrapped tight around her, and as she adjusts his weight to not fall over, he makes a soft sound of protest.
“She’ll literally be in Baltimore. It’s not that far enough.” Jason rolls his eyes again, this time at Dick, and she can feel Dick shift enough she knows he must be sticking out his tongue at him. She pats Dick’s back comfortingly.
As she lets Dick slide back down to the ground, he stares up at her with those heartbreaking, puppy-dog eyes of his. “Are you sure I can’t come with you?”
“You have school tomorrow. You have to go.” She bites back her smile. “I have school in a week, and I got to go.”
“I hate school, though!” Dick says emphatically.
She leans down, whispering loud enough Jason can hear. “Maybe you should see if you can transfer to the public school then. I bet Jason will be lonely when I’m not there anymore.”
“I won’t miss you, Brown,” Jason tells her. But, as she straightens, he offers her a fist bump, and she rolls her eyes and pulls him into a hug instead.
“Don’t let the others kill each other,” she whispers in his ear.
He snorts. “Am I the new peacekeeper?”
“Something like that.” She releases him before pounding a fist over her heart. “Crime Alley Kids, ‘til the end.”
“Crime Alley Kids, ‘til the end.” He copies the motion without hesitation. Then, he seems to soften and he offers her a small smile. “Maybe I’ll miss you. A little bit. You’re leaving me with all the rich kids.”
“You still have the circus brat.”
“Hey!” Dick crosses his arms and huffs, pretending to be mad. “Maybe I won’t miss you.”
“You heard it here first. Dick Grayson wants me to go.”
As she takes a step out the front door, he grabs her hand.
“I didn’t say that,” Dick says with wide eyes.
She messes with his hair. “I’ll miss you too.”
(The hospital only allowed so many visitors the first day, and as Stephanie sat in the hospital bed, alone, at the end of the night, she stared at the little gifts scattered across her nightstand. With all this, she would have guessed she was out longer than half a day in surgery. She can’t reach the balloons or floral arrangements on the other side of the room, but she can reach the gifts on her nightstand.
She lifted the stuffed elephant into the moonlight, admiring the torn stitches and the strange stains on its tusks. Someone taped a sticky note to its side, and she pulled it off, reading the messy, childish scrawl with a smile.
‘Zitka — she gives the best hugs. Love, Dick.’
She knew how much Dick loved Zitka. Those first few months at the Manor, he refused to be parted with her. It was his little taste of home, his little taste of security in the ever-changing world. After his parents died, she was all he had left…
That thought soured.
Stephanie lost both of her parents in a single blow. Every time she stopped thinking about her father and his cold, dead eyes, the way he approached her and took the gun, she thought about her mother shouting in the flames of their old home. She thought about how the last thing her mother said to her had to deal with her betraying the family.
She didn’t have good parents; she would never argue otherwise.
But she had parents, and now she didn’t, and she didn’t know how to reconcile that yet.
So, she hugged Zitka to her chest and pulled the next gift.
A worn copy of the Bad Beginning, the first book in a Series of Unfortunate Events, waited for her. That one had the same pink sticky note, but this one had more delicate, careful handwriting.
‘In case you get bored. See you soon. Love, Jason.’
She didn’t even know Jason could read a book published in this century. Yet, as she ran her fingers along the edges, seeing the dog-eared pages and the creases in the spine, she knew he must’ve loved this book.
Then, she opened it to the first page, and she saw an inscription from his mom. It tugged at her, and she had to close it to blink back the tears. Jason would get it if they ever talked about it. He didn’t have good parents. He had parents, and then he didn’t, and he figured out a way forward anyway.
In the moonlight, with Zitka tucked beneath her arm, she started the book.)
Everyone else waits for her in the car.
She slides into the passenger seat, and she swivels around to get a good view of her family. Duke and Cass sit in the back seat, Cass already booting up her Switch to show off her Animal Crossing village, while Duke flips through the Travel through Europe! book in his lap. She knew Tim already attacked it with a highlighter, marking up every spot Duke needed to investigate, but Duke would also get a chance to just… travel and explore.
Leslie sits behind the wheel, and she smiles. “I thought you might never join us at this rate.”
“Oh, you know the boys. They’re all drama queens.” She exchanges eye contact with Cass, rolling her eyes as obviously as she can, while Cass giggles.
“They’re going to miss you,” Cass proclaims.
“I’m going to miss them too, but you can never tell them that. I have a reputation to maintain.” She leans back, offering her pinky to Cass, and Cass hooks them immediately in a pinky promise.
“They weren’t that dramatic when I left. Should I be offended?” Duke asks with a sly smile.
She nods. “Totally.”
“First stop is the airport then?” Leslie asks as she starts the car. Stephanie tugs her seatbelt on before Leslie can lecture her.
Duke grins. “Yup. I have a flight to catch.”
(“This is going to sound crazy,” Stephanie told him as soon as he entered the hospital room.
Duke paused, arms full of a teddy bear and chocolate. The teddy bear was bright pink with a heart reading GET WELL SOON. “That’s not a great opener.”
“I think it’s a great opener. Is that for me?”
He tossed the teddy bear to her, and she clutched it to her chest. It smelled like strawberries, and, impossibly, it smelled like her home. She sniffed it again, hesitant, before turning to him, a question in her eyes.
“I sprayed it with your perfume,” he said as he claimed the chair next to her bed. “I figured Dick would be taking Zitka back soon—he’s been a little menace without that elephant—and you still want something to cuddle with at night.”
“You are the biggest sweetheart of the family,” she told him.
Duke laughed. “The bar is so low in the Bruce-I-Don’t-Show-Emotions-Wayne household. Give me a real compliment, Stephanie.”
“Actions speak louder with words so…” She offered him her brightest smile as she still clutched the teddy bear to her chest. “How would you feel about a trip to Europe?”
He blinked.
“What?” he asked after a few seconds.
“Okay,” she said slowly, “this is going to sound crazy.”
And she launched into the same explanation Tim gave her.)
As Leslie peels out of the driveway, Stephanie spins around and presses her nose against the glass to see the Manor disappear into the distance. Years ago, she never would have thought she could call a place so extravagant her home. Years ago, she never would have thought she would get an invitation here.
Years ago, she never would have thought she would have better places to be.
“This is home,” Cass signs to her.
Steph shakes her head and reaches back, patting her head. “You guys are home. That’s just a house.”
In between coughs, Duke says, “sap.”
In between coughs, Steph says, “asshole.”
(Cass brought Stephanie a new domino. She waited until visiting hours ended before slipping through the window, and Stephanie rolled her eyes as she watched her little sister slip to the floor and offer it to her.
“I’m not in great shape to go be a vigilante,” Stephanie told her, gesturing at all of the casts and stitches littering her body.
Cass shook her head as she pressed the domino in Stephanie’s hands. “Are you still the Dragon?”
Stephanie laughed. “I don’t think so. Not anymore. That went up in literal flames.”
“I have an idea for a name.” Cass eased down on the bed, sitting at the foot, cross-legged, to face Stephanie. She still wore her Blackbird uniform, but she took off her domino as soon as she entered.
Stephanie raised an eyebrow. “Yeah? Hit me.”
Cass took care to sign out each letter. “O-R-P-H-A-N.”
Stephanie started laughing again.
“Parentless,” Cass told her, “because you raised yourself. Parentless because you don’t need bad parents. Parentless and proud of it.”
“Because I’m enough,” Stephanie finished for her. The name already started to grow on her. She’d probably keep some semblance of that scruffy outfit she created to face her father. She liked having the bulletproof vest on such a clear display. It felt a little like a ‘fuck you’ to the days of struggling to keep up with the most recent heroes, the heroes who had the money and technology to get better gear than her.
“Orphan,” Stephanie repeated.
“Not family-less,” Cass hurried to emphasize.
Stephanie tugged Cass into a hug. “Not family-less. I have my sister right here, after all.”)
Stephanie leans out the window as they start down the streets of Gotham. She reaches up, letting her hair undo with the wind, and she stares at the city which raised her. She grew up on that street corner. She walked home from school on that street. She ran into that light post when she first learned how to drive.
Her dreams aren’t here anymore.
Stephanie is a new woman; Stephanie is someone with room left to grow.
Stephanie is enough.
And she grins at the place which raised her before saying goodbye with her whole heart.